Limitations of Collaborative Public Management in American Fiscal Federalism

This chapter examines collaborative public management (CPM) in the context of the existing, fragmented regional governance structure. In particular, the chapter discusses the limitations of CPM in managing orderly land use planning and intra-regional fiscal inequity due to the inherent tension between localism and regionalism in American fiscal federalism. Researchers have shown that it is unlikely to solve issues involved in equity and redistribution by relying on voluntary inter-local collaboration. At the same time, however, they also acknowledge that local governments have resisted to a regional government and that state governments have hesitated to take action to create a politically accountable regional government. The challenge is to find a way of state’s direct action for region-wide planning and intra-regional redistribution while preserving local governments’ autonomy. As one of the examples, this chapter provides a regional fiscal redistributive policy, tax-base sharing that has been implemented in the Twin Cities metropolitan area since 1975